The Secret Garden (Quito, Ecuador)

Two thousand eight hundred metres above sea level lies a special, transient, popular, yet anonymous place called the Secret Garden. It´s now been about 5 weeks since I´ve been working at this hostel and it has shed a lot of light on the world of backpacking, the hospitality business, and more on my quest for the knowledge of what journey truly means. 

It´s been an interesting ride thus far.  The way the cycle goes, through my own eyes, is that the experience is an acute one, filled with comraderie and dedication.  In the begininning, at the strike of 2012, there were six of us volunteers working at the Secret Garden, and then there were five come mid January, and then a couple left and couple new ones started and the cycle continues. We are all travellers, looking for a break or a unique experience whilst wandering through Latin America. 

My daily routine for the last five weeks is as follows... I either work the morning shift from 7-3 or the evening from 3-11. Both shifts have their ups and downs. Either way, between 12 and 5 every day, the reception and rooftop terrace is dead. We are all fortunate enough to work amidst a gorgeous view of the city of Quito, taking in the mountain ranges, the layers of buildings, houses, churches, statues, glowing night lights, clouds, fog, rain, sun, etc., that the view has to offer.  In the mornings us volunteers wake up in our apartment about 20 minutes before 7, quickly jump into our clothes, brush our teeth and rush off to work, only one block away. We then serve breakfast, welcome check-ins and administer check-outs until the rush is over at 10:30. Of course you always get the straggling backpackers thinking they can check.out just a little later than stated. In the evening, we serve dinner, make cocktails, strike up a fire in a wheelbarrow that subsitutes as a firepit, and entertain the guests, or just entertain ourselves, often fighting over which volunteer gets to plug in their own ipod into the central speakers.  In my time here, I think I have witnessed at least 5 travellers crying, and coming to us for some sort of reassurance or condolence.  I´ve seen people come back from tragic bus accidents, being robbed on the street of their cameras and credit cards, frustrated with airlines and lost luggages, dealing with illness and diarrehea, and even witnessed a man having a stroke in our computer room as I ran around asking if there was a doctor or a nurse in the hostel.  You really get the insider´s view of what goes on in a traveller´s life. 

As well, you start to learn the gossip of who´s who, within the guests and within the staff and volunteers.  If you settle down long enough, this short little volunteer stint becomes your own life.  There is gossip about who is sleeping with who, who is angry with who, who is not doing their job properly, who is quitting, who is excited about their next adventure in life... etc.  Working with the Ecuadorian staff is also great, I get to practice my spanish (I´m taking classes as well, kinda) and get to know them on a personal level. I just finished a conversation with one of our cooks/cleaners about homosexuality in Ecuador, relationships, and marriage. I consider her one of my friends and I am glad to be able to actually communicate with her on a deeper level rather than your basic, surface level conversation when you´re learning a new language.

On the otherhand, after a while, all the backpackers though all start to look the same, I try to learn everyone´s names and remember their faces, trying to make their stay a memorable one, but I gotta say that each one quickly becomes a faint memory to me once they put on their sacks and walk out the door for the last time.  Every now and then I will meet some backpackers that I will make an effort to get to know, whether it is due to them having a longer stay, or they just seem interesting to me. At times I will just give my polite charm, my customer service attention and no more. It reminds me of my retail days at Chapters when I used to serve customers all the time.  But yes, there are definitley some guests that will have a lasting impression on me, and it once again expresses the hello/goodbye cycle that I have written about on many occasions on this blog.  Some connections are made really quickly and vanish just as fast. 

But the other volunteers... now that´s a different story. We all live in the same apartment, four of us even sharing the same bedroom, we eat, sleep, drink, snore, change our clothes, brush our teeth, share stories, laughter, and even tears together... almost 24/7. When we aren´t working together, we are mostly all hanging out together on the terrace, playing cards or shooting the shit. Most nights, after our 11pm shift is over we all go back to the flat and share a few beers between us, laugh about the day´s mishaps, gossip about certain guests and their silly requests, until those of us that have to wake up at 6:40am finally call it a night.  The comraderie between us is strong, living in such an intense setting we are forced to like each other or suffer. They have all become accustomed to my loud snoring and accept it now, whereas before I would hear about it each morning.  And vice versa, I accept their little annoying habbits.

We only get one day off a week. Some of us will take the day to get out of the city and explore Quito´s outskirts, the little tourist towns, the markets, etc.  I on the other hand try to explore the actual city.  Originally I wanted to do this job so that I could really settle down for a bit and get to know one place, feel that connection. So on my days off I just hang out, at times I´ll just be up on the terrace playing cards, but other days I´ll go out and watch a movie, walk around the city, sit in the parks, grab a coffee, go to the night clubs, etc.  I miss city living I guess.  Some days it´s nice to not be a tourist, it´s nice to try and be a local in this city of 3 million people.  However, I am very far from feeling like a local, perhaps within the confines of the Secret Garden I feel like I am at home, like I´m the shit, but once I step out into the big streets I am still a stranger to this capital city that speaks a different language and lives a different culture. 

At the same time, the language and cultural barrier that exists is often not a barrier at all.  I am starting to discover sayings and phrases in spanish are the exact same in my language.  The gossip and the frustrations that employees have with each other are the same that would be experience in my own country.  And today, when my spanish teacher ran up to me in a panic, with tears in her eyes, looking for a pen and paper, and I asked her in spanish what´s the matter and she explained to me in spanish that her grandmother is in intensive care, my Canadian heart and her Ecuatorian heart connected.  Same same but different, goes the saying in Thailand. 

And so now, I have only 9 days left in Quito, and about 20 days left on my 90 day tourist visa.  Soon enough I will have to once again say goodbye, I´ll be that volunteer that will be leaving as others wish me well and welcome a new volunteer into the comraderie, the solidarity, the intense friendship circle that we have.